CHAMBER OF REPOSE
taught by Mahomet, the last of the Prophets. Why should we not witness in India what has happened in Arabia and Persia and Egypt?"
"I admire your zeal, most learned of historians. But do you know, my friend, that the population of Arabia or Persia, or of Egypt could settle down and be lost in one of the fifteen Provinces of His Majesty's Indian Empire? Do you know that instead of a few millions living along the Nile, in the sands of Arabia or on the highlands of Persia, we have a hundred million people in this Empire, mostly wedded to an ancient philosophy and faith which no conqueror has shaken from the time of Alexander the Great of glorious memory?"
"Pardon me, learned Abul Fazel, but vaster continents have embraced the True Faith proclaimed by the Prophet, and within a hundred years after his death the cavalry of Islam drank the waters of the Oxus, the Nile and the Tagus. Asia, Africa and Europe knew of the faith of Islam when it was spread by faithful servants of God under the rule of the Kalifs of Bagad, who owned the Prophet."
"Greatly do I venerate the memory of those Kalifs, noble Badaoni, and greatly do I value their work in uniting the scattered and nomadic races of Tartary and Tripoli, Tunis, Algiers and Morocco, in the worship of One True God. But ancient and populous countries like India and China seek the truth in their own way and according to their own ancient Scriptures. And so long as they all seek the truth it matters little, my friend, in what form they seek it, and in what tongue they proclaim it. Our Emperor's object is to unite not to divide."
"But His Majesty's great predecessors," retorted
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